Splunk AppDynamics vs WhatsUp Gold comparison

Splunk and Progress Software are both solutions in the Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability category. Splunk is ranked #3 with an average rating of 8.2, while Progress Software is ranked #29 with an average rating of 8.7. Splunk holds a 3.6% mindshare in APM, compared to Progress Software’s 0.8% mindshare. Additionally, 91% of Splunk users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 85% of Progress Software users who would recommend it.

Splunk AppDynamics

Read 259 Splunk AppDynamics reviews

13,654 Views
10,377 Comparison Views

91% willing to recommend

WhatsUp Gold

Read 25 WhatsUp Gold reviews

3,998 Views
1,199 Comparison Views

85% willing to recommend

Splunk AppDynamics

WhatsUp Gold

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 23, 2025

WhatsUp Gold and Splunk AppDynamics are both products in the IT operations management sector. WhatsUp Gold has an edge in pricing and support, while Splunk AppDynamics is favored for its advanced features.

Features: WhatsUp Gold provides robust network monitoring, excellent network visibility, and user-friendly interfaces for topology mapping and device discovery. In contrast, Splunk AppDynamics focuses on application performance management, offering in-depth insights, predictive analytics, and end-user monitoring capabilities.

Room for Improvement: WhatsUp Gold could benefit from enhancements in its alerting system usability, advanced integration options, and more detailed application monitoring. Splunk AppDynamics might improve by simplifying initial deployment, refining its extensive dashboard customizations, and reducing false positives in alerts.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: WhatsUp Gold stands out with its straightforward deployment and efficient customer support, ideal for those with limited IT resources. In contrast, Splunk AppDynamics, while more complex to install, provides a broad support network and comprehensive documentation to assist in the setup phase.

Pricing and ROI: WhatsUp Gold is cost-effective with low initial costs offering significant returns, whereas Splunk AppDynamics, though more expensive upfront, justifies its cost with advanced features delivering high ROI through performance optimization.

To learn more, read our detailed Splunk AppDynamics vs. WhatsUp Gold Report (Updated: December 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Splunk AppDynamics vs. WhatsUp Gold

December 2025

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Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:

Categories and Ranking

Splunk AppDynamics

Ranking in Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability

3rd

Ranking in IT Infrastructure Monitoring

6th

Average Rating

8.2

Reviews Sentiment

6.7

Number of Reviews

259

Ranking in other categories

IT Operations Analytics (2nd), Mobile APM (1st), Container Monitoring (3rd)

WhatsUp Gold

Ranking in Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability

29th

Ranking in IT Infrastructure Monitoring

29th

Average Rating

7.8

Reviews Sentiment

6.2

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Network Monitoring Software (30th), Server Monitoring (16th), Configuration Management (19th), Log Management (31st), Cloud Monitoring Software (24th), Network Traffic Analysis (NTA) (10th)

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2026, in the Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability category, the mindshare of Splunk AppDynamics is 3.6%, down from 5.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of WhatsUp Gold is 0.8%, up from 0.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
Splunk AppDynamics	3.6%
WhatsUp Gold	0.8%
Other	95.6%

Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability

Featured Reviews

DevendraKumar1

Technology lead at Infosys

Has enabled us to detect issues instantly through alerts and monitor every service from a single dashboard

Splunk requires significantly more improvements compared to Splunk AppDynamics, specifically regarding the licensing aspect. Splunk renews licenses every six months, which is inconvenient. It would be better to have a one-year license to avoid needing to update keys constantly, which can only occur on weekends, making it a burdensome task. Although Splunk is better for certain use cases, Splunk AppDynamics is broader in functionality. Specifically, I want enhancements related to creating dashboards not only for logs or minor services but also for configuration levels, allowing us to check configurations immediately without manually opening the entire code when exceptions arise—a feature I wish to see improved in Splunk, although it may not be necessary for Splunk AppDynamics.

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Erik Cheng

Technical Manager at Quan Hung Gourmet

Efficient monitoring with detailed customization, yet complexity remains

The best feature of WhatsUp Gold is the automatic generation of topology and its integration with virtualization and wireless. I have used the automated device discovery with this topology feature. The interactive map feature helps me manage the topology because sometimes we cannot draw the topology correctly, so we need to manually edit the connections. The alerting system is very tunable and customizable, but it's a little complicated to use. Many customers cannot manage it by themselves and need support from us, the provider. We always use the dashboards in the SOC, where we constantly display a dashboard or multiple dashboards. This allows us to know immediately if the connection or bandwidth is full or if the connection is broken.

Read full review

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:

Pros

"The alert mechanism in AppDynamics enhances server management tasks by using agents installed on each server."

"I like how the AppDynamics dashboard portrays the information flows. When a task is executed, various flows between different applications and databases happen in the background. The dashboard is intuitive and helps visualize the connections, the directions of the flow, and the information related to these specific sessions."

"It gives me the ability to trace logs between transactions, for example, a DB transaction or JVM transaction from one hub to the other. I can easily find out where the problem is or where the bottleneck of the issues lies."

"The best feature of AppDynamics is the analytics, which gives us the business insights of the application."

"AppDynamics Database Monitoring's dashboarding is its best feature."

"We switched to AppDynamics for its capabilities."

"The event alerting feature or the trigger system is what I like most about AppDynamics Server Monitoring. Whenever an issue occurs, the tool automatically generates an even trigger that tells engineers in the company to take action, so it's an essential feature of AppDynamics Server Monitoring. Another valuable feature of the tool is end-to-end monitoring, which means if you need to debug, you can go transaction by transaction, where the issue lies, and how it's linked. For example, if it's a low-performance issue, you can look into it more through AppDynamics Server Monitoring in terms of which area takes too much time to execute. You can also see the SQL queries and the kind of query going on through the tool."

"The monitoring is similar to Dynatrace."

More Splunk AppDynamics pros

"The tool's most valuable feature is the visibility it offers of everything in the network and infrastructure."

"This is a good, stable network monitoring solution for devices."

"The user interface is good enough."

"We no longer have to manually search for problems because we are alerted when something in the network goes down."

"I use it on premises to monitor my network database. We monitor the link up/down and use the SNMP traps as well."

"The solution effectively monitors network devices and servers."

"It is stable."

"WhatsUp Gold is very easy to deploy."

More WhatsUp Gold pros

Cons

"If we consider the implementation of alternative solutions, such as Dynatrace, there is a notable difference in the approach to agent-based service monitoring. For instance, Dynatrace employs a single-agent solution, which can pose security concerns. When installing Dynatrace, granting the agent ld pro payload rights is a requirement. In contrast, our solution ensures a more secure approach by not requiring root and administration access. While we currently utilize an agent-based solution, there may be a shift in the next one or two years, possibly with the adoption of Open Telemetry. It's anticipated that many APM vendors, including Dynatrace, may alter their structure or strategy for implementation. However, as of now, the trend is towards an increasing number of implementations daily."

"It could do with more than one data centre/multiple AWS accounts in a pane of glass. Also, improved scalability to large environments would be helpful."

"Splunk AppDynamics requires multiple agents; if I have one server with multiple applications in different languages, then I need to instrument different agents for each application."

"The integration with cloud services is still pending with AppDynamics. We would like the product to be serverless."

"The solution must improve security and setup."

"Their agents sometimes claim to be very lightweight, especially with databases, but they are very heavy. They can take up more compute than the actual work that we need to do."

"In terms of improvements we would like to see, we want to understand what the battery consumption metrics are whenever a user is viewing. It would be really helpful for us if we could get those details levels."

"I would like to see accommodation for millisecond granularity, as we only have one-second granularity now."

More Splunk AppDynamics cons

"The product is old and not updated."

"The pricing for this solution has gone up quite recently, which has led some of our customers to buy an alternative product."

"Integrations with other devices. I want to have a product that has full integration with my active directory so I can track user activity. I want to track my complete user activity, so I'm looking for a product to implement in the near future, which will have full integration with my network and active directory users. It became very difficult to track user activity."

"I might like to see a better interface in the future."

"The tool should focus on increasing its market share, as it is the only area of concern where improvements are needed."

"Importing the maps and being able to customize them could be easier."

"Improvements are needed in integration, especially for WhatsApp call and messages. Our region heavily uses WhatsApp Messenger for communication, and integration with this platform would be beneficial."

"The technical support does not bother to respond."

More WhatsUp Gold cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The license fee for Application Analytics is in the range of 2.5 million over three years, with extra fees for service contingencies."

"It's a very expensive product. Each of the licenses after this month for one server is around $9,000 or $10,000."

"The pricing for AppDynamics Server Monitoring in Africa and the Middle East is too expensive, so it's very hard to sell it to customers. If there could be different pricing or package for the region, that would be great. My company pays for the license of AppDynamics Server Monitoring on a per-agent, per-server basis. It's $700 to $1000 per server, and it's paid annually. My company is on a subscription model for the solution. On a scale of one to five, where one is expensive and five is cheap, my rating for the price of AppDynamics Server Monitoring is a two."

"We are looking forward to purchasing the solution on the AWS Marketplace."

"There is a license to use this solution. However, the clients pay for the licenses we are the service provider."

"I would like more flexible pricing: A pay-per-use model, rather than just a fixed-price model."

"AppDynamics offers a yearly basis license."

"The way it is structured in terms of price could be better. You pay for individual modules and that adds on to the cost, which detracts you from implementing those modules and slows you down."

More Splunk AppDynamics pricing and cost advice

"I'm not sure, but it's expensive. We don't pay any additional fees."

"The most valuable feature is the cost compared to other solutions."

"There is a license needed to use WhatsUp Gold."

"It is per device, per year. The pricing is very clear. If you have a service agreement, you get all of your major upgrades and minor upgrades. It was under $10,000 to go all-in with all of the different add-ons for it."

"There are some subscription charges that are quite heavy. I need to pay for support every year and these charges can be quite expensive. Aside from the initial cost for the tool, you need to pay additionally for support."

"This is a well priced solution."

"The pricing can be on the expensive side when considering competing products."

"The tool's price is reasonable. WhatsUp Gold is cheaper than SolarWinds."

More WhatsUp Gold pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

26%

Computer Software Company

11%

Manufacturing Company

Government

Financial Services Firm

12%

Manufacturing Company

12%

Government

11%

Computer Software Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	55
Midsize Enterprise	36
Large Enterprise	194

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	9
Midsize Enterprise	5
Large Enterprise	14

Questions from the Community

Any advice about APM solutions?

There are many factors and we know little about your requirements (size of org, technology stack, management systems, the scope of implementation). Our goal was to consolidate APM and infra monitor...

See all answers

What do you like most about AppDynamics?

The solution saves time and cost.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for AppDynamics?

I would rate the pricing an eight out of ten. The solution is highly expensive. Our company pays for the solution on a yearly basis, if we don't add new modules or features to the license, we need ...

See all answers

What do you like most about WhatsUp Gold?

The interactive mapping interface for scrolling, zooming, and drilling down on an element to learn about a network issue is good. When we see a network there will sometimes be a spot that has one l...

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for WhatsUp Gold?

Clients find the licensing calculator confusing, but we simplify this for them by collecting relevant information first. The licensing is based on devices, providing better cost-effectiveness than ...

See all answers

What needs improvement with WhatsUp Gold?

It would be great if WhatsUp Gold could add features that simplify management with AI, as it is currently too complicated to manage.

See all answers

Comparisons

Dynatrace vs Splunk AppDynamics

Compared 11% of the time

New Relic vs Splunk AppDynamics

Compared 7% of the time

Datadog vs Splunk AppDynamics

Compared 7% of the time

Splunk Enterprise Security vs Splunk AppDynamics

Compared 6% of the time

SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor vs Splunk AppDynamics

Compared 3% of the time

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PRTG Network Monitor vs WhatsUp Gold

Compared 5% of the time

LibreNMS vs WhatsUp Gold

Compared 4% of the time

ManageEngine OpManager vs WhatsUp Gold

Compared 4% of the time

Nutanix Prism vs WhatsUp Gold

Compared 4% of the time

NinjaOne vs WhatsUp Gold

Compared 3% of the time

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Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Splunk AppDynamics

January 2026

Download Splunk AppDynamics product report

Buyer's Guide

WhatsUp Gold

January 2026

Download WhatsUp Gold product report

Overview

Splunk AppDynamics enhances application performance monitoring with advanced diagnostics and real-time insights, offering seamless end-to-end transaction tracking and infrastructure visibility.

AppDynamics provides critical tools for businesses to analyze application behavior and performance. Through innovative features like transaction snapshot analysis and adaptable dashboards, users can quickly identify and address issues, ensuring high levels of system uptime and efficiency. It is designed to support complex environments including Kubernetes and AWS, enhancing user experience by detecting performance issues early. Despite needing improvements in network monitoring and integration, it remains a robust option for tracking application health.

What are the key features of AppDynamics?

Real-time Performance Monitoring: Offers immediate insights into application behavior.
Business Transaction Tracking: Tracks transactions from start to finish for bottleneck identification.
JVM Memory Monitoring: Provides detailed JVM metrics and memory use information.
Deep-dive Diagnostics: Enables in-depth analysis of code and stack traces.
Adaptable Dashboards: Customizable views for better data interpretation.

How does AppDynamics benefit users?

Improved Incident Resolution: Faster problem detection and solution implementation.
Enhanced Application Performance: Real-time monitoring optimizes system operations.
Comprehensive Visibility: Provides a full view of application infrastructure.
Informed Decision Making: Detailed analytics guide performance improvements.
Customer Satisfaction: Enhances user experience through faster issue resolutions.

In industries like financial services and e-commerce, AppDynamics facilitates performance tracking across distributed systems, optimizing infrastructure to meet consumer demands. It excels in environments needing precise transaction monitoring and is pivotal in delivering high value and satisfaction.

Splunk

Explore and manage your entire network infrastructure effortlessly with WhatsUp Gold's robust layer 2/3 discovery, creating a detailed interactive map from the edge to the cloud. Monitor devices, wireless controllers, servers, virtual machines, applications, and traffic flows across various environments. Real-time alerts ensure optimal performance, allowing you to meet or exceed SLAs. The platform offers customizable maps, dashboards, and alerts for easy network management. Quickly resolve issues with intuitive workflows, reducing Mean Time to Resolution (MTTR). WhatsUp Gold's integrated log management provides easy visibility and control of device log data, allowing monitoring, filtering, searching, and alerting on syslogs or Windows logs. Archive logs to comply with regulatory requirements and preserve historical data, all through a user-friendly interface. Streamline network monitoring and issue resolution with WhatsUp Gold, making network management efficient and hassle-free.

Progress Software

Sample Customers

Cisco, Sony, Nasdaq, Reserve Bank of New Zealand, Edmunds.com, Puma, Fox News, DirecTV, Pizza Hut, T-Systems, Cornell University, OpenTable, BITMARCK, Green Mountain Power, Care.com, Overstock, Paddy Power, eHarmony, Kraft, The Motley Fool, The Container Store, and more See more customers

Artoni Trasporti, Austin Independent School District, Banca Marche, Burke County North Carolina, Cambridge University School of Clinical Medicine, Clayco, Community Integrated Care, Desca, Deutsche Bergbau, Flexi-Van, Gropper, Hamleys, Hammonds Furniture, Knowledge IT, Idras S.P.A., Sibeg, Swann Engineering, Trivium Lindenhof

Buyer's Guide

Splunk AppDynamics vs. WhatsUp Gold

December 2025

Free Report: Splunk AppDynamics vs. WhatsUp Gold

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